Ian Miller

Current positions

Assistant Director, Salford Archaeology

Biography

With more than 30 years’ continuous experience as a professional archaeologist, Ian is currently Assistant Director of Salford Archaeology within the Centre for Applied Archaeology, University of Salford. During the past 12 years, Ian has compiled successful tender documentation (including costings) for more than 300 projects in the commercial archaeology sector, ranging from small-scale watching briefs, evaluations and historic building investigations, to medium- and large-scale excavations and associated programmes of post-excavation assessment, analysis and, where appropriate, publication, and continues to procure new enterprise projects in his current role. He takes full responsibility for the overall management on all of these projects, including the preparation for the investigation (devising the project aims and research objectives), the fieldwork, health and safety, and the interpretation, analysis and presentation and/or publication of the project data. Ian is also required to manage the performance and development of teams and individuals including task allocation, preparation and monitoring of work plans, identifying project-specific training needs and assessing work performance.

Ian has particular experience of managing the archaeological investigation of historic industrial sites, often in complex urban environments. At the invitation of English Heritage, Ian has also contributed short papers for inclusion in national guidelines for the investigation of historic industrial sites. Most recently, he was responsible for the excavation of Richard Arkwright’s Shudehill Mill in Manchester city centre, which is being undertaken as part of the NOMA Project, the largest urban regeneration scheme in England outside of London. This followed on from a large-scale excavation of workers’ housing, which was carried out in 2008-09 as an initial stage in the NOMA scheme that focused on the development of the new headquarters for the Co-operative Group on Miller Street. He has been responsible for delivering a plethora of similar excavations in Manchester and Salford that have targeted the sites of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century workers’ housing, including excavations in Piccadilly, Chorlton-upon-Medlock, Hulme, and on Bengal Street, Mill Street, Bradley Street, George Leigh Street and Jersey Street in the Ancoats area of Manchester, and also on Adelphi Street in Salford.

I contribute to the following modules:

Principles and Practice of Archaeological Techniques

The Archaeology of Industrialisation in Britain 1600-1900